A2DRC Research Update Seminar with Dr. Francesca Polverino

Thu, 12/13/2018 - 4:00pm to 5:00pm

The Asthma & Airway Disease Research Center (A2DRC) at the University of Arizona Health Sciences Campus Presents:

Research Update Seminar Series

Thursday, Dec. 13, 2018
4 - 5 p.m.
UA College of Medicine - Tucson
Conference Room 2343

“Deconvoluting COPD endotypes by profiling the adaptive immune system”

Presented by:

Francesca Polverino, MD, PhD
Assistant Research Scientist, A2DRC
Assistant Professor, Medicine
Division of Pulmonary, Allergy, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine
University of Arizona 

Francesca Polverino, MD, PhD, is an assistant professor of medicine at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Tucson and an active member of the UA Health Sciences Asthma and Airway Disease Research Center. Her clinical and research interest is chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). In 2010, after completing her medical degree and doctorate, she moved to Harvard University where she studied the pathobiology and the systemic manifestations of COPD. Dr. Polverino published seminal papers focused on the mechanisms leading to the onset and progression of COPD. She discovered that the B cell Activating Factor, a key molecule involved in autoimmunity, is overexpressed in COPD patients' lungs and contributes to the formation of lymphoid follicles (AJRCCM 2010 and 2015). She has also identified two molecules which are expressed in the lung and are protective against cigarette smoke-induced lung damage and COPD: Club Cell Protein 16 (CC16, European Respiratory Journal 2015), and A-Disintegrin and A Metalloproteinase Domain 8 (AJRCCM 2018), and has described the first non-human primate model of COPD (American Journal of Pathology 2015). From a clinical standpoint, Dr. Polverino reported for the first time that patients with COPD also suffer extensive kidney damage (AJRCCM 2017). In 2017, Dr. Polverino became an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Polverino joined the faculty at University of Arizona in August 2018. She has been awarded several prestigious international recognitions, including the Parker B. Francis Fellowship (2016), and the Rising Star of Research Award from the American Thoracic Society (2018).

Please join us!

Contact: Eva Barrow, evachere@email.arizona.edu

Event Location: 

Asthma & Airway Disease Research Center
University of Arizona Health Sciences
1501 N. Campbell Ave., Room 2343
Tucson, AZ 85724